Ecology, Environment and Conservation Paper

ANNUAL DYNAMICS OF THE MITE COMMUNITIES (ACARI: ACARIFORMES AND PARASITIFORMES) IN SEMI-COLLARED FLYCATCHER’ (FICEDULA SEMITORQUATA) NESTS

Rositsa Davidova, Viktor Vasilev and Maria Boycheva

Abstract

The aim of the study is to identify the annual dynamics of species variety, number of specimens and structure of the mite communities, which inhabit semi-collared flycatchers’ nests and to examine whether it is affected by the temperature and relative humidity. The research was conducted in the period between 2012 and 2015. The results show that there was a significant variation in the number of species and specimens in different years. Only two out of 12 species were found in all four years. The structure of the communities stayed the same in the 2012, 2013 and 2015, dominated by the species D. gallinae. In 2014 we found a completely different a-typical structure, which was on the one hand due to the fact that the communities were dominated by A. casalis, H. lubrica and H. heselhausi and on the other – due to the extremely low presence of D. gallinae and the absence of O. sylviarum. The regression analysis showed that there is an inversely proportional relationship between the relative humidity and the abundance of mites. In the current research a relationship between air temperature and the abundance of mites is not established.